Word History: When it is first attested in the middle of the 17th century, the French word boucanier, later borrowed into English as buccaneer, referred to French traders on the islands of Hispaniola and Tortuga. The traders hunted the feral cattle and boars on the islands for their hides, and they smoked the meat in a barbecue frame known in French as a boucan. The French word came from the Tupí word for a wooden rack used for roasting. The original barbecuing buccaneers subsequently adopted a more remunerative way of life, piracy, which accounts for the modern meanings of the English word.

buccaneer

(ˌbʌkəˈnɪə)

n

(Historical Terms) a pirate, esp one who preyed on the Spanish colonies and shipping in America and the Caribbean in the 17th and 18th centuries

vb (intr)

to be or act like a buccaneer

[C17: from French boucanier, from boucaner to smoke meat, from Old French boucan frame for smoking meat, of Tupian origin; originally applied to French and English hunters of wild oxen in the Caribbean]

buc•ca•neer

(ˌbʌk əˈnɪər)

n.

a pirate, esp. one who raided Spanish colonies and ships along the American coast in the second half of the 17th century.

They cast a fearful glance at the spot where the buccaneer had disappeared, almost expecting to see him sailing on his chest in the cool moonshine.

Several days elapsed before Wolfert could summon courage enough to prosecute the enterprise, so much had he been dismayed by the apparition, whether living or dead, of the grisly buccaneer.

Wolfert felt a chill pass over him as they passed the point where the buccaneer had disappeared.

by the expiring light of the fire he beheld, just over the disk of the rock, what appeared to be the grim visage of the drowned buccaneer, grinning hideously down upon him.

There was snarling and growling as of a cur, mingled with curses, in which Wolfert fancied he could recognize the voice of the buccaneer.

He could not be mistaken; it must be the buccaneer.

I must not omit to mention another report, also, which I confess is rather apocryphal, of the buccaneer who is supposed to have been drowned, being seen before daybreak, with a lantern in his hand, seated astride of his great sea chest, and sailing through Hell Gate, which just then began to roar and bellow with redoubled fury.

His heart leaped with joy, for he doubted not they were the private marks of the buccaneers.

It's the name of a buccaneer of my acquaintance; and I call you by it for the sake of shortness, and what I have to say to you is this; one glass of rum won't kill you, but if you take one you'll take another and another, and I stake my wig if you don't break off short, you'll die-- do you understand that?

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